


wrapped up

by silverkatana



Category: Shinhwa (Band)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, M/M, Merry Christmas, ambiguously platonic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 06:54:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17137079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silverkatana/pseuds/silverkatana
Summary: in which hyesung discovers he's terrible at wrapping presents, and ends up calling the only person he can rely on.





	wrapped up

Two nights before Christmas, Jung Pilkyo finds, to his utter frustration, that he isn’t the best person at wrapping presents. As a matter of fact, he is rather terrible at it.

 

Very terrible, he decides in dismay as he stares confusedly at the ripped wrapping paper with pieces of tape in a mess of places here and there. He  _ could _ ask Junghyuk, he supposes, but it only takes him a matter of seconds to reject the thought. If Junghyuk can wrap presents, he will be able to do it too, he insists firmly to himself, deciding to attempt once more. Conveniently ignoring the shreds of paper and tape strewn around his floor that’s clear evidence of his prior failures, of course.

 

Approximately six minutes and forty-nine seconds later, Pilkyo tosses the scissors to the ground and leans back with a frustrated groan. How hard can wrapping presents possibly  _ be _ for him to manage to screw it up every single time? 

 

Very,  _ very _ hard, apparently.

 

The faintest of scowls marks his expression as he grabs at his phone instead of the wrapping paper, fingers hovering for a moment over Junghyuk’s contact before he scrolls past and reaches a different contact. Unlike his indecisiveness over whether to call Junghyuk or not (he’s convinced his neighbour would just laugh at him), he presses down on the ‘call’ button instantly.

 

It rings, and it rings, and it continues ringing to the point that the annoying generic ringtone is stuck in his head, and for a moment he wonders whether his call would even be picked up. He realises a little too late that the Shinhwa members are absolutely  _ terrible _ at receiving each others’ calls - or rather, prefer not to - and he’s just about to hit the ‘hang up’ button when the phone line crackles a little and a familiar voice sounds.

 

“... Hyung?”

 

“Andy-yah!” At that moment, Pilkyo displays what one can only describe as a 360-degree change in personality, a voice twisted in irritation now dripping saccharine sweet like golden caramel layered across cream cake. He puts up an impressive show of  _ aegyo _ even in those two syllables that he speaks, enough for even his loyal fans to cringe away from if they were to hear it, and he’s met with dead silence.

 

The line crackles again. “Wait, Andy, wait no don’t hang up on me,” he mutters into the phone, reverting his tone back into a relatively normal one, “I swear I’m not drunk.”

 

Another few seconds trickle by, and Pilkyo is beginning to get unnerved by the long amounts of silence. Andy finally decides to respond by way of a long sigh, before asking bluntly, “What do you need this time?”

 

“I don’t need anything,” Pilkyo is quick to answer, but he forgets that he is known for being awful at acting, and Andy’s cough that some way or another is coated with scepticism is enough to tell him that the youngest member does not believe a single word of his.

 

“Then I’m hanging up.”

 

Pilkyo lets his gaze trail over the pile of presents, gloriously untouched, much less wrapped, and resigns himself to his fate. “Listen, I love you a lot, and I promise I’ll buy you a meal or give you whatever you want after this, but… Can you come over?” A quietude of sorts settles over his living room at the lack of a response, and he tries again, “Andy? Andy, are you there? Sunho? Andy, did you hang up on me, you little brat-”

 

“What was that, hyung?” comes the accurately-timed reply, all cheeky and playful and brimming with mirth, and Pilkyo has to suppress a groan - of all the times that Andy feels like teasing him, must it be now (even if he cannot say he is surprised)? “What were you calling me? If I heard correctly, a little-”

 

“- A little lonely, that’s right, I’m a little lonely right now and you are the love of my life so please do come over to my house and keep me company,” he blurts out whatever passes through his mind, hearing Andy’s dubious snort from over the connection, and adds in quickly, “I really promise I’ll give you whatever you want as long as you don’t destroy my bank account.”

 

“I just came over recently, though,” Andy protests, “You could’ve called any other friend to keep you company, so why me if you’re feeling lonely?”

 

Pilkyo has never felt more defeated before, and in the end he mostly gives up and decides to tell Andy the truth, complete with barely understandable spiels of flattery and attempts to entertain Andy because he really does need help. “I can’t wrap presents,” he confesses flatly, hearing Andy burst into full-blown laughter, “Christmas is two days away. Please save me.”

 

He doesn’t know if Andy actually understood the hastily strung-together sentences of endearment and adulation or if the younger of the two is just taking pity of him, but eventually Andy agrees to drop by his house. He hastens to prepare a couple of drinks and some snacks that he has lying around the house, hoping that Andy won’t get too mad at him for being made to wrap all of his presents.

 

The doorbell rings maybe twenty minutes later, and he greets Andy with a hug and a grateful peck on the cheek - which, having had years of experience, Shinhwa’s youngest expertly dodges and continues walking as if nothing had occurred.

 

Andy finally speaks when he lays his eyes upon the small mess in the living room. “Hyesung hyung,” he articulates slowly, turning to face Pilkyo with a raised eyebrow, “When you said that you couldn’t wrap presents, I didn’t think you meant you really were completely useless at it.”

 

Pilkyo shrugs - it’s not like he can argue with the words, however playfully biting, when the evidence is right in front of them. “I am pretty useless at this,” he admits, “Help me, please.”

 

The minutes tick by like that, with Andy seated on the ground slowly wrapping presents and Pilkyo pacing around the room not quite knowing what to do until Andy groans and beckons him over. “I’ll just teach you how to wrap presents,” he exclaims, apparently fed up with Pilkyo’s aimless wandering, and Pilkyo grudgingly agrees despite his own sense of self-doubt that he’ll be able to wrap as neatly as Andy. 

 

He tries, he really does, but somewhere along the way the shape of the wrapping is odd and the tape doesn’t quite sit well. “No, not like that,” Andy yelps out, shuffling over quickly to help by wrapping his own fingers over Pilkyo’s and smoothening out the wrapping paper before re-applying the tape with a meticulousness that Pilkyo watches with distant admiration. The wrapping is re-done, looking a lot better than Pilkyo’s attempt, and is added to the growing pile of Andy’s neatly-wrapped presents.

 

“So do you know how to properly wrap the presents now?” Andy queries, and that’s when Pilkyo reaches the conclusion that  _ no _ , he absolutely does not, because the entire time that Andy’s hands were on his guiding him he was zoning out and thinking about irrelevant things.

 

He doesn’t even have to put his sheepish thoughts into words for Andy to understand; the younger rolls his eyes, mumbling under his breath something along the lines of ‘this hyung, I swear’ before putting on a sugar-sweet smile and saying, “I’ll do it once more, so please pay attention this time” which Pilkyo knows is an euphemism for something more along the lines of  _ if you don’t learn this time I’m leaving and ditching you here so you can wallow in a pool of misery over the remainder of your unwrapped presents. _

 

“I’ll learn,” he promises hastily as he picks up the next present, this time watching Andy’s movements carefully for every crease, fold and flatten of the wrapping paper, of the neat even strips of tape and the way everything is fitted just right so that there isn’t loose space around the corners but there are no crinkles along the paper from being pulled too tight either.

 

Pilkyo tries his best after the demonstration, and by his third - or is it fourth? - present he’s certain he’s almost at Andy’s level, his wrappings getting neater and neater with every present. By the time the two of them finish working through Pilkyo’s pile of presents, it’s difficult to distinguish a handful of presents wrapped by Pilkyo from the ones wrapped by Andy; although there are a number of wrapped presents that do look admittedly shoddy, but in his exhaustion Pilkyo decides that it’s the effort that counts.

 

“See?” Andy gestures at the presents piled neatly by the Christmas tree, the corners of his eyes crinkling a little as he grins at Pilkyo. “It isn’t that hard. You could’ve just searched the Internet or something, you know.”

 

“Maybe I just wanted some company,” he retorts feebly. “I get lonely, you know.”

 

Andy pauses, running his eyes over Pilkyo’s face, and then: “... You already searched the Internet and still couldn’t figure it out, huh?”

 

Pilkyo can feel his ears going hot, and he covers the flush across his cheeks with his palms, pouting at the cheeky youngest. “You’re not allowed to know me so well,” is the only comeback he can spout out, making Andy dissolve into fits of laughter. Eventually, he begins laughing too, and the sound of their chuckling is the only thing that fills the air for a while, and Pilkyo finds that he doesn’t mind.

 

He quite enjoys it, in fact, sitting on his living room floor under the fairy lights of the Christmas tree hearing the sound of his and Andy’s free laughter resonating in his ears.

 

He’d never say it aloud to Andy (or any of the members, at that) lest he get teased for it, but he truly is glad for his company. He knows Andy well enough, too, to understand that he probably feels the same way; after all, they live away from home now, and it is a nice feeling to spend the nights before Christmas without feeling alone. 

 

It is a clichéd thought that crosses his mind, but in the winter of Seoul where cold winds blow and snowflakes rest against his cheeks, at least he is warm with Andy right here with him.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> hope you have a merry christmas!
> 
> (and also please support andy's latest album)


End file.
